The PC market is holding its breath waiting for the release of Windows 10.

For the last two years PC sales have been sliding slowing as most people did not see the need to upgrade anything that was not borked, particularly when they could be saving money.

The Tame Apple press claimed that it was all because this genius Steve Jobs gave the world tablets, but since sales of these have slid faster than PC sales it is more likely that people just could not be bothered. A PC which was bought about five years ago is probably still working and the new breed cannot really do much more.

Figures released from both Gartner and IDC both agree that the PC market has already declined around 10 percent year over year. In fact the figures would have been a lot worse had people not had to upgrade their ten year old Windows XP machines, IDC said.

However the belief is that the PC market is still expected to stabilize soon. "While the PC industry is going through a decline, the market is expected to go back to slow and steady growth in 2016," notes Gartner.

IDC expects the Windows 10 launch will go "relatively well," but warns that many will opt for the free OS upgrade rather than purchase a new PC. This suggests to us that Microsoft has worked out that it is better not to to tie itself ot new hardware purchases in the way it used to.

Both IDC and Gartner agree that Lenovo is still the top PC manufacturer, with HP second and Dell third.

Microsoft has reinstated some of the most important features of Windows, the solitary games are back, and it seems that it won't stop just there.

Since the Redmond based company has acquired Mojang, the creator of Minecraft, for $2.5 billion, it was logical to expect some splashy announcement of the game's future.

Microsoft has just announced that Windows 10 gets its own version of Minecraft and it will cost only $10. The version that works on Windows, Mac or Linux sells for $19.95. Things are getting even more attractive for the owner of the Minecraft, as they will get to download the Windows 10 edition beta for free.

Since the game earned a distinguished title of best selling game of all times, it doesn’t come as surprise that Microsoft wants to push this game with the new operating systems. In late 2014 Mojang announced that they sold 60 million copies across all platforms,with 100 million registered users as of late February 2015.

Microsoft plans to offer following features to the early adopters of Minecraft: Windows 10 Edition Beta:

Craft, create, and explore online with up to seven friends playing Windows 10 Edition Beta, through local multiplayer or with your Xbox Live friends online.

Play online and local multiplayer with other Pocket Edition players thanks to a free update, due to arrive soon after launch.

Support for multiple inputs – switch between controller, touch, and keyboard controls with little to no effort

Record and share gameplay highlights with built-in GameDVR.

Help shape the future of Minecraft: Windows 10 Edition Beta with built-in player feedback mechanisms

Japan's nuclear industry, which has not been particularly lucky in recent years, might be suffering from a bad case of addiction to Windows XP.

You would expect cutting edge technology would be controlled by the latest computers, with software which could handle anything which you can chuck at it.

However the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), operator of the Stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear energy complex, has been told off by accountants for being entirely dependent on Windows XP.

Japan's Board of Audit, an organisation that oversees the finances of Japan's government and government agencies has told EPCO to migrate 48,000 internet-connected PCs off Windows XP pronto.

TEPCO has been moaning that it can't afford the cost of cleaning up its last melt-down and the audit released in late March was supposed to show how it could reach a state in which it can pay its dues.

TEPCO thought a good way to save money operates would be to defer upgrading its ancient PCs and operating systems until 2019.

However the Board of Audit said the upgrade needs to go to the top of TEPCO's to-do list, on the grounds.After all the operating system's insecurity makes it a target for hackers who want to own a nuclear power station or two. But hell who would have thought of that.

After a slump in the use of Windows XP, it appears that some daft people are re-installing it, even as they walk away from Windows 7.

Statcounter has Windows 7 dipping a little to 54.13 per cent and Netmarketshare has it up 0.07 per cent to 55.99 per cent of detected desktops. Both outfits have Windows 7 below highs recorded in 2014. Windows 8.1 is up from 10.04 per cent in January to 10.49 per cent in February on Netmarketshare's numbers, and from 14.27 per cent to 14.78 per cent according to Statcounter.

However what is alarming is that Windows XP use is starting to increase again – making it the herpes of operating systems. Statcounter had it up from 11.99 per cent to 12.23 percent. Netmarketshare has it edging up from 18.93 per cent to 19.15 per cent.

Those figures have Windows XP growing only a little more slowly than Windows 8.1! This is based on the traffic as it hits web servers. It is possible that someone is building banks of old XP machines to hit internet websites, but surely there are better ways to do that.

British companies are still refusing to upgrade their operating systems despite Microsoft giving up on Windows XP. Support for XP officially ended in April but large businesses are still running Microsoft's Windows XP operating system (OS) and are paying Redmond a fortune in costly custom support contracts.

A new survey by systems management company, Adaptiva, found that many companies with over 10,000 PCs had yet to migrate from Windows XP. The Adaptiva survey found that 15 per cent of organisations have signed up for extended support from Microsoft.

Apparently the biggest problem that companies are facing is software compatibility (about a third) although some could not afford the time (15 per cent) and four percent could not afford to upgrade. More than 17 per cent plan to move directly to Windows 8 or a mixed Windows 7/8 environment.

Adaptiva found 81 per cent of the businesses surveyed reported that the cloud had no impact on upgrading and patching OSs and applications, but seven per cent said the cloud made upgrading harder.

Software king of the world Microsoft is quietly defusing a potential PR nightmare following its pulling the plug on Windows XP. Microsoft has not revealed any details but it appears to have been cutting the costs of its paid support for Windows XP by up to $82 million.

The last support patch for XP was issued on 8 April, with all users being repeatedly warned about the looming deadline and encouraged to upgrade. Governments and large enterprises around the world failed to meet the deadline mostly because they had invested shedloads in bespoke applications and databases. Many of these groups subsequently signed up to pay millions for custom support arrangements with Microsoft – the UK government alone shelled out £5.5 million for a one-year deal.

But some users have not being paying up and Microsoft has been forced to drop the cost.

Daryl Ullman, co-founder and managing director of the Emerset Consulting Group, told Computerworld one of his clients turned down a quote of $2 million from Microsoft for continued support of 10,000 PCs. However, a few days later, Microsoft made a new offer of $250,000 which was accepted. The UK government must be kicking itself.

Microsoft discontinued support for Windows XP earlier this month, which prompted more than one security scare. However, Microsoft and various security outfits were quick to reassure the public. Even though there was no official support, XP could be patched and kept secure.

However, it is now starting to look as if the biggest problem was caused by none other than Redmond. More specifically, Microsoft Security Essentials (MSSE) is killing XP boxes, just in case we needed an extra dose of irony and sarcasm this morning. Microsoft discontinued support for XP on April 8, but it is still updating MSSE for XP users. The last update to the Anti Malware Service for Windows XP seems to be the culprit.

Who needs an infection when you’ve got Microsoft?

Microsoft Security Essentials is the source of the problem. For some reason the security suite starts acting up and cases XP systems to slow down dramatically, rendering them practically useless in some situations.

The bug was narrowed down to MsMpEng.exe. This is the process that needs to be killed in order to fix the problem. It’s not as easy as it seems. Users need to disable Microsoft Security Essentials to get rid of the issue, which can be tricky for novice users, especially office folk.

Users have to open Windows Run, type “services.msc” and disable it on startup. Hopefully MSE will not load on reboot and things will be back to normal. Not much of a problem for techies and enthusiasts, but most tech savvy users migrated from XP years ago.

IT departments aren’t amused

The problem appears to be affecting loads of XP boxes worldwide, but since it’s relatively new we don’t have any exact figures or estimates for that matter.

We talked to an IT manager at a local insurance company and we were told that it’s quite common.

“It knocked out about 20 of our machines yesterday. It’s still going on, we lost five more this morning, in under an hour,” we were told.

Mind you, we are talking about a relatively small branch office. The insurance firm in question, Euroherc, is one of the leading insurers in the region. Our source told us that the number of affected machines should be multiplied by “dozens” to take into account all branch offices in the region, which are experiencing the exact same problem.

Luckily IT departments are used to this sort of thing and the problem is being addressed. Since it’s not too difficult to resolve, most XP boxes were up and running in a matter of hours.

Home users and SMBs are getting the worst of it

However, not every company has an IT department and not every user can deal with the problem without assistance.

A retailer told us that his office has been taking angry calls from dozens of consumers who bought XP boxes or licenses over the last few years. People are upset and retailers are losing credibility through no fault of their own. Needless to say they are not happy.

Explaining the problem and guiding users through the necessary steps is not easy and it’s time consuming. Worse, there are a lot of XP users who simply can’t deal with it on their own, from pensioners to SMBs who don’t really care about tech as they have a couple of cheap boxes to sort out emails and print stuff.

Of course, there are those who insist that it’s all a grand Redmond conspiracy to get people to upgrade to Windows 7 or Windows 8.1, but like all conspiracy theories out there, it doesn’t make any sense at all. Someone made a mistake, a big mistake, that’s all.

The latest desktop OS share trend from NetMarketShare suggests that Windows XP users are not rushing to buy a new OS. In March, XP’s share dropped just 1.84 percent, from 29.53 percent to 27.69 percent.

Those who have migrated have not been following Microsoft’s direction and upgrading to Windows 8.x. Instead, they are moving to Windows 7. While Windows 8 actually increased share in March and Windows 8.1 gained some the combined Windows 8.x increase is a mere 0.62 percent.

Windows 7 on the other hand, rose from 47.31 percent to 48.77 percent, an increase of 1.46 percent, or more than double Windows 8.x’s growth. All this means is that Windows 8 is definitely not benefiting from the death of Windows XP and Windows 7 is starting to look like it will follow XP as Microsoft’s longest living OS.

It looks like the security industry has seen money in propping up the elderly Window XP software. Malwarebytes has released Anti-Malware Premium, a new tool designed to protect home PCs against what it calls advanced criminal software which traditional anti-virus cannot detect.

However, what is interesting is that the outfit is claiming that it will support XP users for life. Apparently, they make up 20 per cent of Malwarebytes’ user-base and could be at greater risk when updates stop on April 8. So it could be marketing, but it could indicate that Redmond might have difficulty killing off the OS if it is being propped up by the security industry.

Malwarebytes Anti-Malware Premium apparently uses Anti-Rootkit technology, which rips out and fixes the damage done by malicious software hiding at an extremely deep-level in the operating system. Premium has added updated malicious URL blocking and enhanced protection from unwanted programs such as aggressive adware and toolbars. A new user interface and ultra-quick threat scan, ensure the product is easy to use.

Malwarebytes Anti-Malware Premium is available from the online store for an annual subscription of $24.95, and provides coverage for up to three PCs. Users with existing lifetime licenses for Malwarebytes Anti-Malware PRO will receive a free upgrade to the new product.

Those still running Windows XP are starting to notice that the software is actually slowing down. This defies a rule which says that software, running on machines that work, should keep running at the same speed that it did when it was born.

According to Ars Technica the old operating system is working considerably worse than when it was released in 2001. It is especially slow if you are still using Internet Explorer 6 or 7. The culprit is the svchost.exe, which is chewing up the entire processor. Sometimes it can take an hour for a machine to return to normal.

Redmond thinks that the problem is Windows Update. Machines using Windows Update retrieve patch information from Microsoft's servers. That patch information contains information about each patch: what software it applies to and what knowledge base article it relates to, and, critically, what historic patch or patches the current patch supersedes. Since Windows patches are cumulative a fresh install of Windows XP, does not need to install all of the dozens of Internet Explorer 6 patches sequentially; you can generally just install the latest patch, and it will include all the historic fixes because it supersedes the historic patches that introduced those fixes.

But the Windows Update client components used an algorithm with exponential scaling when processing these lists. So while a new machine, that processing is almost instantaneous. On an elderly machine it is very slow.

Microsoft thought that it had this problem fixed in November when it culled the supersedence lists. It tried again in December but that didn't seem to help either. It is probably better to scrap XP anyway.